COVID-19 and the exacerbation of educational inequalities in New Zealand

New Zealand’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic was “to go fast and go hard”. This directive meant closing the borders, requiring returning New Zealanders to go into two-week self-isolation and, on 25 March 2020, putting the entire country into full lockdown. Schools had a short period of time to get ready to offer online learning. The move highlighted the country’s social, economic and educational divide. On television we were shown children with laptops working at home in their designer living rooms, talking to their teachers through Zoom with their parents hovering around supportively. However, this was not the reality for all. There are parts of the country with limited or no Internet connectivity. There are high poverty areas where households do not have basic materials, let alone computers or other devices suitable for use as learning platforms. A survey of schools showed that only half the schools in the country felt that their students would be able to access online learning. The Ministry of Education had to quickly organise the delivery of learning packs of printed materials to outlying areas, laptops and modems to low-income communities and set up a home-learning television channel with programmes in English and te reo M?ori (the indigenous language). Studies are now revealing that despite these efforts, and as the COVID-19 economic impacts begin to bite, New Zealand’s at-risk students have fallen even further behind. This article discusses these research findings and highlights what was learnt from the COVID-19 experience in order to begin to redress these disparities

Gently, gently: A school-university participatory research partnership in a post-disaster setting

In 2010/2011, the city of Christchurch and the surrounding district of Canterbury in New Zealand suffered a series of devastating earthquakes. A study led by The University of Auckland and co-funded by UNESCO followed schools as they came to terms with these events and began to rebuild their lives. The process to recruit and engage schools was slow and respectful as we built trust with first one school, then another. We offered a facilitative and participatory process where each school could choose how they wanted to proceed, who they wanted to involve and what they wanted the outcome to be. We engaged the students in various activities (narratives, video-making and arts-based activities) to help them process the events and move forward. The outcomes included a community mosaic, an illustrated book and video documentaries. This article charts the evolving partnerships between university researchers, school principals, teachers, students and parents. The lessons learned about successful school-university partnerships are summarised under dispositional, relational and situational factors.Keywords: School-university partnership; participatory research; disaster settings; children and young peopl

Citizenship in Action: Young People in the Aftermath of the 2010-2011 New Zealand Earthquakes

Young people’s declining civic and political participation is the subject of much public and media angst. This article argues for a fresh look at the concern. Evidence to support a new way of viewing participation is drawn from a study of the way in which young people (early-teens to mid-twenties) spontaneously demonstrated their abilities to engage in civic and political actions in the aftermath of the devastating earthquakes that hit the New Zealand city of Christchurch and the surrounding district of Canterbury during 2010 and 2011. The actions of these young people is set first in the context of relevant research, focusing on literature that critiques or offers alternative explanations of young people’s seeming lack of engagement in civic and political activities. This is followed by a study of the collective actions motivated and managed by young people after the New Zealand earthquakes, such as the Student Volunteer Army and the Ministry of Awesome. These actions are theorised against several explanatory frameworks in order to promote an understanding of a more youth-centric view of young people’s participation

RESEARCH Open Access

Involving consumers and the community in the development of a diagnostic instrument for fetal alcohol spectrum disorders in Australi

Rucaparib maintenance treatment for recurrent ovarian carcinoma after response to platinum therapy (ARIEL3): a randomised, double-blind, placebo-controlled, phase 3 trial

Background: Rucaparib, a poly(ADP-ribose) polymerase inhibitor, has anticancer activity in recurrent ovarian carcinoma harbouring a BRCA mutation or high percentage of genome-wide loss of heterozygosity. In this trial we assessed rucaparib versus placebo after response to second-line or later platinum-based chemotherapy in patients with high-grade, recurrent, platinum-sensitive ovarian carcinoma. Methods: In this randomised, double-blind, placebo-controlled, phase 3 trial, we recruited patients from 87 hospitals and cancer centres across 11 countries. Eligible patients were aged 18 years or older, had a platinum-sensitive, high-grade serous or endometrioid ovarian, primary peritoneal, or fallopian tube carcinoma, had received at least two previous platinum-based chemotherapy regimens, had achieved complete or partial response to their last platinum-based regimen, had a cancer antigen 125 concentration of less than the upper limit of normal, had a performance status of 0–1, and had adequate organ function. Patients were ineligible if they had symptomatic or untreated central nervous system metastases, had received anticancer therapy 14 days or fewer before starting the study, or had received previous treatment with a poly(ADP-ribose) polymerase inhibitor. We randomly allocated patients 2:1 to receive oral rucaparib 600 mg twice daily or placebo in 28 day cycles using a computer-generated sequence (block size of six, stratified by homologous recombination repair gene mutation status, progression-free interval after the penultimate platinum-based regimen, and best response to the most recent platinum-based regimen). Patients, investigators, site staff, assessors, and the funder were masked to assignments. The primary outcome was investigator-assessed progression-free survival evaluated with use of an ordered step-down procedure for three nested cohorts: patients with BRCA mutations (carcinoma associated with deleterious germline or somatic BRCA mutations), patients with homologous recombination deficiencies (BRCA mutant or BRCA wild-type and high loss of heterozygosity), and the intention-to-treat population, assessed at screening and every 12 weeks thereafter. This trial is registered with ClinicalTrials.gov, number NCT01968213; enrolment is complete. Findings: Between April 7, 2014, and July 19, 2016, we randomly allocated 564 patients: 375 (66%) to rucaparib and 189 (34%) to placebo. Median progression-free survival in patients with a BRCA-mutant carcinoma was 16·6 months (95% CI 13·4–22·9; 130 [35%] patients) in the rucaparib group versus 5·4 months (3·4–6·7; 66 [35%] patients) in the placebo group (hazard ratio 0·23 [95% CI 0·16–0·34]; p<0·0001). In patients with a homologous recombination deficient carcinoma (236 [63%] vs 118 [62%]), it was 13·6 months (10·9–16·2) versus 5·4 months (5·1–5·6; 0·32 [0·24–0·42]; p<0·0001). In the intention-to-treat population, it was 10·8 months (8·3–11·4) versus 5·4 months (5·3–5·5; 0·36 [0·30–0·45]; p<0·0001). Treatment-emergent adverse events of grade 3 or higher in the safety population (372 [99%] patients in the rucaparib group vs 189 [100%] in the placebo group) were reported in 209 (56%) patients in the rucaparib group versus 28 (15%) in the placebo group, the most common of which were anaemia or decreased haemoglobin concentration (70 [19%] vs one [1%]) and increased alanine or aspartate aminotransferase concentration (39 [10%] vs none). Interpretation: Across all primary analysis groups, rucaparib significantly improved progression-free survival in patients with platinum-sensitive ovarian cancer who had achieved a response to platinum-based chemotherapy. ARIEL3 provides further evidence that use of a poly(ADP-ribose) polymerase inhibitor in the maintenance treatment setting versus placebo could be considered a new standard of care for women with platinum-sensitive ovarian cancer following a complete or partial response to second-line or later platinum-based chemotherapy. Funding: Clovis Oncology

Two single-headed myosin V motors bound to a tetrameric adapter protein form a processive complex

The yeast class V myosin Myo4p moves processively in vivo in a cargo-dependent manner following formation of a double-headed complex with the adapter protein She3p and the mRNA-binding protein She2p

A modified Delphi study of screening for fetal alcohol spectrum disorders in Australia

Background: There is little reliable information on the prevalence of fetal alcohol spectrum disorders (FASD) in Australia and no coordinated national approach to facilitate case detection. The aim of this study was to identify health professionals’ perceptions about screening for FASD in Australia. Method: A modified Delphi process was used to assess perceptions of the need for, and the process of, screening for FASD in Australia. We recruited a panel of 130 Australian health professionals with experience or expertise in FASD screening or diagnosis. A systematic review of the literature was used to develop Likert statements on screening coverage, components and assessment methods which were administered using an online survey over two survey rounds. Results: Of the panel members surveyed, 95 (73%) responded to the questions on screening in the first survey round and, of these, 81 (85%) responded to the second round. Following two rounds there was consensus agreement on the need for targeted screening at birth (76%) and in childhood (84%). Participants did not reach consensus agreement on the need for universal screening at birth (55%) or in childhood (40%). Support for targeted screening was linked to perceived constraints on service provision and the need to examine the performance, costs and benefits of screening. For targeted screening of high risk groups, we found highest agreement for siblings of known cases of FASD (96%) and children of mothers attending alcohol treatment services (93%). Participants agreed that screening for FASD primarily requires assessment of prenatal alcohol exposure at birth (86%) and in childhood (88%), and that a checklist is needed to identify the components of screening and criteria for referral at birth (84%) and in childhood (90%). Conclusions: There is an agreed need for targeted but not universal screening for FASD in Australia, and sufficient consensus among health professionals to warrant development and evaluation of standardised methods for targeted screening and referral in the Australian context. Participants emphasised the need for locally-appropriate, evidence-based approaches to facilitate case detection, and the importance of ensuring that screening and referral programs are supported by adequate diagnostic and management capacity